Modi’s Master Stroke For India’s Unification – A Lesson For Sri Lanka
S. Sivathasan
In the evolution of Indian unity, there has been a quantum leap in 2015. Through a strengthening of the states, Modi has set the pace for meaningful national integration. Not spending time playing on patriotic fervor, he has put his finger on the correct lever to move the economy and to touch on people’s materialistic aspirations. Investment of local financial resources further augmented by foreign inflows is the strategy. Such a mode was not unknown to his illustrious predecessors. Then, wherein lies the difference? Identifying the most sympathetic chord that resonates with the states, distinguishes his uniqueness. With a sense of pragmatism he seeks to add verve to it.
Over Centralism
In the last century and more the flow of thought and insights was that India’s downfall came through her political disintegration. This in turn it was perceived, derived from weakness at the centre at varying times in her history. The years preceding independence were plagued by unmanageable religious conflict. Partition of India heralding her independence was a traumatic experience. Princely fiefdoms, 563 in all tore at the seams of the Indian fabric. The iron hand of Vallabhai Patel was needed to keep India together. Nehru had the intellectuality to know it all. Historians and men of learning provided the academic back up to political leaders. The result was a single India. The casualty was a unified India.
Excessive obsession with unity struck at the very roots of unification. The problems that India faced in embarking on the modern were Himalayan. Even a century was inadequate. Seven decades are now very nearly past and yet India has miles to go even to touch the very periphery of parity with developed nations. Nehru’s strategy of linguistic states was a great achievement that consolidated major ethnic groups into a composite entity. The policy implemented in 1956, abated tensions that were growing and spoiling unity even within states.
